Life has been a series of random collisions, like the projected path of atoms entering and leaving substances large and small, dense and light. Some impacts ricochet, others move and alter.
A friend of mine said, “The bubble gum doesn’t care how you chew it. First it molds, does what you want, then it gets hard (like some people) or turns to mush. Whatever the case, like life, if you use it too long it’s worthless and should have well gone on to something more useful”.
It was a confession of soul, of depth. A life that had been useful had become old and that which once was satisfying disappeared. He asked if it happened quickly or had the transition slowly imposed itself.
What I wanted to say was it happened quickly. That yesterday there had been 36 employees and a thriving energetic business then poof today there was nothing. But the fact was the change was slow. The dying took forever and the patient and business resisted the inevitable until all the blood had drained from both.
The business died. The employees and products, buildings and land; that was gone, but left was the bloodless carcass of the dead owner and like a spider skeleton moved endlessly with each puff of wind, neither alive nor buried. A forgotten corpse, last rites unsaid.
Speaking for myself, money has been a great motivator while poverty passed the side of my expensive cars was noticed and ignored. But, the images stayed, lingered until becoming so plentiful that darkened windows and exclusive resorts could not keep the color from blending with the bright day.
Everything around me said too late for them and now for me. My friend said, “Change your gum”.
He was respected as an individual. Not quite average in height, but a giant among his peers. “You can forget your troubles only when you find that which is of real value.”
I thought, who cares how corny he is, at least talking to him isn’t an entirely strange prospect. He had a lithe humor and a spirit that matched the smile always present on his off center face. He took me on as a sheep. I accepted him as a shepherd and did slight tasks where my help was needed. Drying dishes, once. Cooking another time, but always with good disposition and for service projects.
When he suggested that regular visits to an invalid residence would be of great benefit to their community, I said, “How can you talk to a toothless wrinkled face with slobber slipping from wrinkles at the mouth’s corner? They’re offensive to look at.”
He said, “Your dog licks you. That’s offensive.”
Angry and admitting to myself that it wasn’t clean, I replied, “He’s mine.”
My friend winked and said, “And they are us, the rest of humanity.”
When offering my limited services, it was done with the double negative approach. “You don’t really need me, do you? I’m tightly booked on any day ending with a ‘Y’.” Thinking that the clever remark would put me on a standby list had them more anxious than ever to accept the help. They filled out the application papers, did a time and resource study of me and welcomed a warm, newly volunteered body.
Anna was 93, her head sparse with grey and yellowed hair. She sat in a wheel chair nodding in syncopation to some unheard sounds playing rhythmically deep within a Parkinson prison. I remember thinking, ‘Knock knock, is anyone there?’ when the smile greeted me.
Anna spoke and sprayed. The droplets floated across the window through the light of the sun while I quickly but too slowly moved to escape the bacteria mixed expectorate. What she said first disappeared with the droplets falling. She knew what had happened was disgusting to me and that personally it was offensive.
So, I’ve never liked body fluids; always had revulsion for them and with my reaction our first impressions had been marred.
Her feelings were not my concern. Getting the spit and phlegm from my arm and face were. I’d been rubbing vigorously almost desperately to remove the offending material when I looked at her. The reaction had been panic and fear. Those eyes were filled with water squeezing out tears when she blinked. Her arm more bone than flesh lifted arthritic fingers to hide a face becoming damp. She appeared to have been abandoned a life time when shaking she said, “Please don’t go.”
She was correct I was in fleeing mode. Everything my body stood for said get out; while the good manners that I’d been taught committed an act of treason. “Don’t worry I’m not going. Just let me know when you’re having a bout of projectile vomiting.”
Not the thing to say to a sensitive 93 year old. It ripped out the last vestige of dignity. She gathered large quantities of choked sounds, releasing them in rapid bursts, some loud some muffled and controlled all while I had an urge to cover her mouth and hold until she stopped. I just didn’t want anyone to relate the distress to me as its source.
“Come on, lady, I was just trying to joke. Ya know make a funny to disrupt the tension.” She slowed the chokes and tears sat stiffly straight, stepped back fifty years into a time when she had composure commanding attention, “You sir are inconsiderate, discourteous, rude, ill-mannered, impertinent and tasteless.”
I added, “And loveable to all my friends.”
She continued with, “Don’t interrupt me.”
Of course an interruption followed again, “But at least you don’t sound like you feel sorry for yourself.”
That’s where the friendship started. For two years she looked forward to the conversations. I looked toward seeing her for three quarters of that time. She knew sooner that the friendship was solid and the dependency had become reciprocal. That the summer sun was brighter when shared the picnics more idyllic.
My kids came to know her as grandma. Although they didn’t spend every moment with her they understood the careful eye that watched them, sometimes taking a break from play to stop and hug or touch Grandma Anna.
We arrived at the rest home to pick her up and were met at the door by attendants. “Anna’s not well; perhaps you should leave your family here while you see her.
“No.” And we trailed all the tattered spirit of us, into that room with the lethal quite. Her bed was tilted and she saw the family, acknowledging them with a faint smile. She lifted her hand and then holding mine, she died, with her eyes open looking into mine; attaching one last time to the filigree thread given to her at birth, the hold on a last breath. Like a final dance her eyes sparkled when knowingly she knew I’d taken the gift she was giving. She had touched me, returned to me, where never before vulnerable; my soul.
Finally, I’d changed my gum.
David Sabosky
